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EJToday: Top Headlines

EJToday is SEJ's selection of new and outstanding stories on environmental topics in print and on the air, updated every weekday. SEJ also offers a free e-mailed digest of the day's EJToday postings, called SEJ-beat. SEJ members are subscribed automatically, but may opt out here. Non-members may subscribe here. EJToday is also available via RSS feed. Please see Editorial Guidelines for EJToday content.

"Kurdish and Iraqi forces seized control of Iraq’s largest dam from Islamic State militants as the U.S. deployed air power that helped reverse some gains made by the Sunni-Muslim insurgents in the north."

"Under threat from rising sea levels and tsunamis, the authorities of a provincial capital in the Solomon Islands have decided to relocate from a small island in the first such case in the Pacific islands."

"ASTORIA, Ore. — The salmon here in the Columbia River, nearly driven to extinction by hydroelectric dams a quarter century ago, have been increasing in number — a fact not lost on the birds that like to eat them. These now flock by the thousands each spring to the river’s mouth, where the salmon have their young, and gorge at leisure."

Discovery Channel's Shark Week is able to draw as many as 53 million viewers. While the cable outlet has included some conservation information in recent years, it seems to be shifting back toward fear-mongering based on fantasy rather than fact. The productions include Photoshopped film of a "megalodon" that is extinct, "deadliest" sharks that haven't killed anyone, and scientists played by actors.

"The Environmental Working Group said Thursday there are nine elementary schools in Iowa that are within 200 feet of a corn or soybean field, a concern the green group highlighted as regulators consider whether to approve a controversial new herbicide."

"A federal magistrate has dismissed most of a lawsuit by environmental advocates challenging the government's approval of numerous pesticides, but said they can pursue claims that federal officials allowed 11 chemicals on the market without getting up-to-date information about hazards to endangered species."

"CONAKRY, Guinea -- Staff with the World Health Organisation battling an Ebola outbreak in West Africa see evidence the numbers of reported cases and deaths vastly underestimates the scale of the outbreak, the U.N. agency said on its website on Thursday."

"In Pennsylvania’s Susquehanna River, one of the longest in the northeast, male smallmouth bass are sprouting female egg cells in their testes. According to a United States Geological Survey report released in June, these intersex fish appear in water — both in this river and two others in the state — that has become saturated with estrogenic compounds, natural and artificial hormones in animal manure and, to a smaller degree, sewage."

"The ancestral connections of tribal coastal communities to the ocean’s natural resources stretch back thousands of years. But growing acidification is changing oceanic conditions, putting the cultural and economic reliance of coastal tribes—a critical definition of who they are—at risk."

"A new concessions contract for businesses on the South Rim of Grand Canyon National Park will cost the park $100 million, an amount that could impact just about all operations in the park, Superintendent Dave Uberuaga said Wednesday. In the long run, however, the move stands to benefit both the park and its visitors, observers believe."

"Low rainfall linked to the El Nino weather phenomenon has led to drought in parts of Central America, causing widespread damage to crops, shortages and rising prices of food, and worsening hunger among the region's poor."

"MIDDLESEX, Pennsylvania — If you stand beside Bob and Kim Geyer’s farm on Denny Road at 3:30 p.m. on a Wednesday, it is mostly quiet, except for the faint sounds of the local high school’s flag team band practicing in the distance."